Earth & Sky (7 page)

*****

I hurried along the corridor toward the stairs, pulling
out the front of my shirt to let some cool air touch my sweaty skin.  I had placed
a hand on the wide banister, poised to dash up the stairs, when a voice called
to me from below.  Pausing, I turned to Logan, drumming my fingers on the banister. 
He gave me a wave and rushed over to stand at the base of the stairs, waving me
back down.  I shifted from foot to foot, not wanting to be late for my classes,
but Logan looked like he was about to burst, so I reluctantly took a couple of
steps back down and took the sheath he had come to deliver .

One of my father’s advisors rushed by, heading for a
meeting room down the hall.  He was little more than a blur.  Logan’s ruddy
complexion was flushed and he was a little breathless.  “Have you heard?”  I
frowned at the brown-haired man, wondering what he was so worked up about. 

“Calm yourself, idiot,” I said affably.  “What’s the
problem?”  Another advisor rushed by and my pulse sped up.  It had to be
something serious.  Of course, no one would think to include me.  No one but Logan,
that is.

“The Sky clan’s emperor is dead!  The whole town’s
buzzing.”  He grinned up at me, knowing what this would mean.  “You’re going,
right?”

I leapt off the stairs and brushed past Logan, my mind
already a million miles away.  “Thanks!”

I rushed to the meeting room.  A hot flush was building in
my cheeks, but the rest of my body was cold.  Pausing, I rubbed my clammy hands
on my soft leather pants and entered the room.  Winona was already there,
seated at father’s side.  Her brown eyes squinted a bit when she saw me and I
raised my chin a notch.  Her long fingers toyed with the hilt of her dagger,
protruding from its new leather sheath.

The advisors had their maps spread out on the table.  Jonas,
the king’s chief advisor, trailed off as I approached the big plank table, “attack
while they are weakened….”  Generals Yates and Maddox were standing nearby, and
I felt their eyes on me as I entered the room.

I placed my hands flat on the table and met my father’s eyes. 
“Let me lead the attack.”

 I would prove that I was loyal, ready to lay down my life
for my family and my clan.  Maybe then they would stop treating me like an
unwanted guest.

Winona shook her head.  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said
acidly.  “I’m obviously going.  Your job is to defend me while I lead.”

Yates shook his head.  “Winona, think of your position. 
If you were queen, it would be reckless for you to do this.  A monarch must use
the tools he has been given.”  His gaze lit on me and I narrow my eyes at him. 

General Maddox came to stand at my side.  “Are you sure
you want to do this?”  His voice gave away no emotion.  He was probably
worried, but he wouldn’t stop me.

Father and Winona shared a long glance, and I wondered if
they had planned to send me all along.  Father’s deep voice filled the room. 
“Prove yourself.”

Adrenaline surged through me.  I straightened and pulled
the huge map closer, recalling all of the strategy I had studied, and all the
drills I had won.  My chest felt constricted, and I wiped my palms on my pants
again.  Then I squared my shoulders and met the eyes of each person in the
room.  I recalled the atrocities the Fallen had committed.  How many children
had grown up like me, missing a parent or a loved one because of the monsters? 
A sort of jittery determination settled over me.  I was born for this. 

W
inona
followed her father’s sturdy frame into his private study.  She closed the door
with a thump and started pacing, her cheeks burning with twin spots of red fury. 
“I can’t believe you’re letting her go!  I should be marching out, leading the
army.  No one would question my authority if I were to lead the battle that was
the beginning of the end for the Fallen!”

Her father sank into a chair behind his big wooden desk.  Pulling
open a drawer, he brought out a glass decanter and two tumblers.  He let Winona
fume as he carefully poured the whiskey.  Standing, he handed her a glass.

“Calm yourself,” he said flatly.  “This will only be a
small battle, the first of many before they fall.”  He sipped his whiskey and
gave her a steely look.  “Let your sister have her day.  It’s her place to do
the fighting.  If she’s successful, you’ll know that you can trust her at your
side.”  Winona downed her whiskey in one swallow, and then slammed the tumbler
down on the desk.  “And if she dies in battle, the threat to my dominance will
be removed.”

Her father sighed in exasperation.  “You don’t mean that.”

She turned on a boot heel and went to oversee the battle
preparations.  Wren was probably bungling it.  Nevertheless, the nagging
thought remained; what if she is does well?  What if the troops realized how
strong her little sister really was?

T
he
wind is blowing, tugging me forward across the muddy field.  It whips the ends
of my hair across my face, and it stings.  As I walk forward, I can smell
battle- mud, metal, magic, blood… and fear.  Here and there, some of the long
grass remains un-trampled and it sways in the wind, dancing among the
wreckage.  I turn my head.  The wind whips my hair into my eyes and mouth.  The
wayward strands stain my view of the world, painting it red.

 Father is at my side, in full armor.  He is covered in
blood- not his, but that of the Fallen enemies he has slain.  Despite this, his
armor shines as an errant ray of light makes its way through the grey skies. 
Winona is at my other side.  She looks like father, bloodied and weary, but
glorious- strong and righteous, her golden hair like the halo of an avenging
angel.

Tears are coursing down my cheeks.  There is a row of
bodies, piled up, awaiting removal.  They make a line in front of us, neatly
stacked.  Some are Shifter, some are Fallen.  All are bloody and beaten.  The
line extends forever in each direction. 

On the other side of the bodies, on a slight rise,
stands a Fallen warrior.  He is in full armor with a tall, plumed helm hiding
his face.  His sword is planted before him.  His long hands rest on the hilt. 
He is huge, towering over father and Winona at my sides.  His black wings are
spread, as if he is poised to fly.  Piercing eyes the same color as the
overcast sky bore into me, daring me to move.  My hands clench, looking for my
knife.  It isn’t there.  I look down.  I am naked.  The wind that blows across
the battlefield is icy, chilling me to the bone.  I am shaking with the cold.

I clamber over the pile of bodies toward the enemy
warrior.  I glance over my shoulder.  Winona and father have turned their backs
on me.  They are walking away, leaving me here with this fearsome enemy without
a backward glance.  The warrior stretches out his arms, reaching for me.  I
tumble over the cold, stiff limbs and unseeing faces of the bodies.  I find my
feet on the other side of the line. 

He’s waiting.  He smiles and I see fangs, sharp enough
to rend me to shreds.  I step into his arms.  Black wings curl around me,
blocking out the light and stopping the cold wind.

*****

We advanced on the open field.  A sense of repressed
excitement mingled with the anxiety I felt pulsing around me.  Yates and Maddox
rode at my side, supervising, but ultimately I was in charge.  Of an army.

I let my aura reach out a bit, hoping to calm my troops
without calling too much attention to my dominance.  My hands inside my thin
leather gloves were clammy, and I flexed them uncomfortably.  I had trained all
my life for this.  The fear I felt wasn’t fear of death or fighting, it was
fear that I would fail as a commander.  I would do everything I could this day
to prove myself.  I hoped it would be enough.

I tightened the bright metal cuff that covered most of my
right forearm.  Then I strode forward, leading the rush to the field.  The
Fallen were there, waiting.  The truth is, wars are not fought and won in a
single battle, or even a single day.  Especially those with the history and
scope of our war.  It would be a slow wearing away at their hold on the land,
before they finally fell.  Today would be a turning point to set the tide
against them while they were still reeling from the loss of their ruler.

Someday, the horrors the Fallen inflicted on Shifter and
Human alike would cease.  I was proud to be a part of that change.  I thought
of my mother as I sprinted through the tall grass.  It wasn’t so much a though
of vengeance, but the acknowledgement that I would do what I could to stop the
death.

Rain began to fall, a slow drizzle that would turn the
field into a muddy skating rink.  I turned my face up to the dampness as I
ran.  Before I knew it, the clashing crash of battle was upon me.  I engaged
the first Fallen warrior I came to, striking my hands together and pulling my
cuff into a long, rough double-edged length of metal.  Worked metal is nearly
impossible to form, but if I had something to work with, like my cuff, I could
manage something effective.  It wasn’t pretty, but it worked.  The world was a
blur as I spun and kicked and struck at my enemy, always moving.  His long
blade whipped past my head and I darted under his arm, driving my knife up
under the seam of the armor that covered his torso.  He fell back and I turned
to face the onslaught of the next enemy.

 I fought my way free so that I could scan the
battlefield.  We seemed to be slowly surging ahead.  Most of my men had Shifted
and the field was filled with apex predators and winged monsters.  A few of us-
the stronger magic users- still fought in human form, which would allow us to
use our alchemy. 

I slapped my hands together, focused my energy, and called
on my power to create a huge concrete slab, which I dropped on a group of
fallen.  One of them caught it at the last moment, using his energy to blast it
to pieces.  Rubble flew everywhere, but I was already moving.  I threw up a wall
in front of a group of my people as they were attacked by a vicious group of
Fallen.  It gave them time to gather themselves.  When the wall fell, they were
collected and ready to meet the onslaught. 

A ripple of energy reached me and I glanced across the
field to see a spear of blue lightning strike the ground.  It radiated outward,
stunning the nearby Shifters and leaving them helpless while they were
attacked.  I ground my teeth together and drew my attention away from the melee. 
There was nothing I could do to save them.  My eyes searched the field for the
magic wielder. 

I saw him, perched in a tree not far from the lightning
strike.  I bit my lip and materialized a huge rock just above him.  His
attention was on the field until it was too late, and the boulder smashed into
him, knocking him from his perch.  He didn’t get up again.

I reached the outskirts of our line and three fallen
rushed me at once.  I pulled long wooden spikes from the air and threw them,
one after another.  The warriors slowed to avoid the spears, giving me time to
draw my pistol. 

I don’t know how long the battle went on around me.  It
felt like hours, but was probably only seconds.  My attention touched every
part of the field.  Fling magic here, counter energy there, bear arms as
needed.  My purpose wasn’t to fight, but to clear the way for my soldiers so
they could do what they had been trained for.  I found Yates and pointed to the
far east side of the field where a group of our men were becoming scattered. 
He dashed there and began rounding them up, focusing their efforts.  A Fallen
dropped out of the sky nearly on top of me and I rolled, darting behind a big Shifter
with an even bigger sword while I re-loaded. 

General Maddox was nowhere to be seen.  I scanned the
field with my power, finally feeling his aura.  He was at the outskirts of the
fighting, behind our lines, organizing an effort to move the injured out of
harm’s way.  I slowly became aware that although the majority of my troops were
making their way through the Fallen’s lines, there was a wild swirl of fighting
at the center of the field where we were at a standstill.  I formed a small
rise to allow me to see over the heads of my comrades. 

At the center of the melee was a huge Fallen warrior.  He
stood head and shoulders above most of the men around him, swinging a long katana
with deadly skill.  His massive black wings were as much of a weapon as the
steel he carried, knocking people aside, and launching him into the air where
he dove down upon his enemies with demonic ferocity.  The Fallen didn’t mark
their leader the way a human army would- we had no difficulty telling friend
from foe- but I thought this might be their general.  He was certainly
powerful, and although he rarely paused in his physical attacks to use magic I
could feel it there, waiting to be unleashed. 

I leapt from the hill and wove my way through the
fighting, ducking and dodging to keep from engaging anyone else until I arrived
at my target.  I reached for my sword, drawing the heavy piece from my hip in a
wide, powerful two-handed arc that cleared my way.  Baring my teeth, I fought
my way through to the center of the field.  I had to stop that monster.

Intent on my goal, I took an elbow to the face, knocking
me down in the mud, and I was almost trampled.  I pushed myself to my feet and
slapped the ground, flinging myself up into the air on a spike of rock.  Using
my momentum, I flung my body skyward, as if I had wings.  I leapt over the
backs of the people in front of me.  Hitting the ground hard, I tucked and
rolled from the point of my shoulder to the opposite hip, never losing my grip
on my sword. 

I stood from my crouched position and he was there.  He
towered over me, huge, glistening black wings outstretched as he wielded that
long, wicked blade.  He moved like lightning, striking not at me, but at my
sword.  The blow numbed my fingers and I cried out as the blade tumbled from my
grasp.  He lunged, swinging the deadly blade in a wide two-handed arc…behind
me?